The First Baptist Church on 3rd Street in Troy will soon become a College Fraternity house. (Mike McMahon / The Record)

TROY - Members of a local fraternity have set their sights on the former First Baptist Church along Third Street in downtown, joining other local groups looking to make use of the city's historic religious structures.

The Tau Nu chapter of Phi Gamma Delta is interested in the church at 82 Third St. and a three story masonry building on the church's south side, once the First Baptist Christian Education Center. The church most recently housed the Troy Preparatory Charter School. Both the church building and the adjoining structure have been on the market for $300,000.

A representative of Tau Nu will be going before the zoning board of appeals Feb. 5 for a use variance hearing. City officials may decide then whether a fraternity's chapter house would be an appropriate use for the church complex.

Tau Nu, housed on the campus since shortly after they were granted a charter in 1984, have long yearned to move off campus.

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"They've been looking for decades for a permanent home," said Matt Hunt, associate dean of Greek Life Commons. "If RPI decided to redevelop the residence halls they are currently in, that would leave them without a house."

This possible relocation would create a residence for all fraternity members and, with their own property, Tau Nu could compete more strongly against the other well-established fraternities in recruiting new members. A long term aim, the recent efforts were spurred by the fraternity's size.

While all of a fraternity's members do not necessarily prefer to live at a chapter house, Tau Nu, with more than forty members, is well beyond the 28 person capacity of their current residence. The fraternity is also in good standing, said Hunt, and has not been suspended in the period since the new class entered.

Also in the fraternity's favor is the church's non-tax status as a religious institution. If Tau Nu were to acquire the Third Street church, the property, with an estimated value of $388,010, would move onto the city tax rolls.

Tau Nu, through the larger Phi Gamma Delta organization, has retained Redmond Griffin -- a city attorney with a long history of working with people looking to find adaptive reuses for city buildings -- to represent the fraternity to the zoning and planning boards.

Griffin said it is in the city's best interest to approve the measure, so as to keep the building from becoming a future liability. If the church taxes are not paid for three years, the building will become the property of the city. The Watervliet city council was faced with a similar prospect last November when the towering St. Patrick's Church was due to fall into their hands. The council decided to zone the property commercial and so grant the Nigro Cos. the option to purchase and demolish the church and erect a Price Chopper.

First Baptist, built in 1846, and St. Patrick's are two of the more recent in a long line of churches forced to shutter their doors due to dwindling attendance, leaving opportunities for organizations and companies to make use of the unused space.

In 2007, one such church, the former Potter's House Christian Church at 3361 Sixth Ave. was bought by the Sanctuary for Independent Media, a video-based community arts initiative.

Tau Nu would not even be the first fraternity in the city, much less the region, to find a home in an old church. Last September, twelve members of fellow RPI fraternity Phi Sigma Kappa officially moved into the former St. Francis de Sales Roman Catholic Church on Congress Street.

"They did some work in the church space proper and planned to use it for their activities and I know that's happened," said Joseph Fama, with Troy Architectural Program, Inc., who was involved in renovating the church. "They did a very good job of explaining themselves and making commitments which, thus far, they've kept beautifully."

It took Phi Sigma Kappa three tries before they were granted approval by the city zoning board for a use variance. Community meetings held outside those city functions were key, said Fama, to convincing both the community and the board that the fraternity was a good fit.

If Tau Nu is approved, they might, like Phi Sigma Kappa at St. Francis, become part of their community and help write a new chapter in their church's long history, as well as a new page for downtown.